It's Called Marriage
by sarah.altair
Summary: Amy Pond and Rory Williams find out adjusting to normality after traveling with the Doctor for so long may be more difficult than they expected. From 06x11 "The God Complex" - 07x05 "The Angels Take Manhattan."
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: **Even though the Ponds are gone, I think there are still a few stories left untold. Inspired by "Pond Life" and waiting-for-the-tardis. Thanks in advance for comments and critiques!

* * *

_Chapter One – Set sometime between "The God Complex" and "Closing Time"_

Amy Pond didn't care what the Doctor said: she enjoyed Sundays. They were a break from it all: the traveling, the job searching, the possibility of getting lost on some strange planet for twenty years only to have her life rewritten. The Doctor didn't land on Sundays, which meant that she was free to lounge around the house, doing absolutely nothing.

Rory was at the hospital. Like Amy, he also enjoyed Sundays. He scheduled as many shifts as he could on Sundays – just in case he fell through a gap in time and couldn't make it to work on Monday. Amy sometimes wished he would stay home. She would like the quiet afternoon with just him. But she knew how much he enjoyed helping people. Besides, seeing as their adventures were the reason Rory often missed Monday's work – and sometimes the rest of the week – it only seemed fair to give him one day of the week off.

So Amy had the afternoon to herself. She lounged on the sofa, her eyes taking in the living room. Her and Rory's living room. It had been a couple months since the Doctor had dropped the two of them off at this beautiful house with that gorgeous red car – which Rory loved – and she still couldn't quite believe it. She hadn't seen her beloved raggedy man since, even though everywhere she looked, she half-expected to. Maybe he had meant it when he said they were done. That he was giving them up while they were still breathing. Because that's what you do when you care about someone. You put them above yourself.

Maybe this was real life now.

Still, even on a lazy Sunday like today, a part of Amy still hoped that the Doctor would come back. He would knock on her door, having already swooped up Rory from the hospital, and bring them on some spectacular adventure. It seemed hard to believe it could all be over.

Amy blinked. She could have sworn she heard– No, it must have been her imagination. After all, she had just been hoping for a knock on her door. It seemed like too much of a coincidence for it to happen now. Then again, Amy had spent enough time with the Doctor to know stranger things had happened than a knock on a Sunday afternoon.

Amy walked to the door. The packed duffel she always kept handy – just in case – was resting against the coat closet. She smiled and reached for the door handle. A single word rested on her lips. She opened the door.

"Doctor–"

Amy stopped. It wasn't the Doctor. It was a woman.

"You're my mum," Amy murmured.

Tabetha Pond still didn't feel real to Amy. Yes, Amy could recognize the red hair and warm eyes she had inherited – and she still remembered a few memories of apples and smiley faces from before the crack in her bedroom appeared – but once upon a time, her parents had been erased from all of time. Little Amelia Pond had been left alone to fend for herself. Sure, time had been rewritten. Sure, Amy's head was now filled with memories of Sunday brunch and of vacations in Scotland – but those felt like fairy tales. They were the stories lonely Amelia had told herself so many times she thought they were true.

"I'm so glad I caught you," Tabetha Pond said. "I was worried you were out again – traveling or whatever it is you and Rory have been up to."

Amy shrugged. "Not today. Rory's at the hospital though. On shift."

Tabetha Pond smiled. "That's good to hear, I suppose. He works so hard."

Amy nodded absentmindedly. She never knew quite what to say to this woman who supposedly raised her. Silence fell between them.

"So," Amy said, finally breaking the ice. "What are you doing here?"

Tabheta Pond frowned. "Checking up on you, of course. It feels like your father and I haven't seen you in years. Right after the wedding, you just upped and left for your honeymoon – which I suppose is normal, yes – but then you kept going. Kept traveling to all these places, without so much as a postcard. We wouldn't have even known you were back if Brian Williams hadn't told us."

Amy sighed. Of course Rory kept in contact with his dad. She was surprised Rory hadn't called his father from the TARDIS. Amy never had that problem. She knew she'd never be able to explain what had happened to Augustus and Tabheta Pond.

"Well, that's great, I suppose," Amy said, holding onto the door handle. "But we're all fine, so there's nothing to worry about. You can go home and relax now."

"Hold on," Tabheta Pond said before Amy could close the door. "Amelia, are you all right?"

Amy flinched. There was a reason she had given up that name. But she couldn't let Tabheta Pond see that. She might mistake it as a sign of Amy's sadness – might suspect just how fragile of a foundation her so-called daughter's life was on – and insist on coming in. After everything that had happened, Amy didn't know what would happen if she let Tabheta Pond in.

Amy smiled. "Of course, I'm fine. Super."

Tabheta Pond nodded, worry in her eyes. Amy recognized that look. She had been a mother too, even if the woman on the other side of the door did not know that. Amy could understand a mother's fears.

"You're always so distant," Tabheta Pond murmured. "Ever since you were a little girl."

"That's because I knew how to take care of myself," Amy said. It came out harsher than she expected. She tried to soften the blow. "Which means you don't have to worry."

Amy tried to place a comforting hand on Tabheta Pond's shoulder. It felt a bit awkward. She let her arm drop to her side and made a mental note not to try that again.

"Trust me, Mum," Amy said, letting the unfamiliar name slip off her tongue as smoothly as she could. "I'll be all right."


	2. Chapter 2

When Rory Williams came home, his wife was waiting for him in the kitchen. She did not seem pleased.

"Oh no," Rory said. "What happened?"

Amy shrugged. "My mum came over."

Rory tried his best to smile. "Well, that's not too bad, right?"

"I suppose not." Amy looked out the window into their patio.

Rory placed down his work bag. He walked over to his wife, placing his hands on her shoulders. He massaged them gently. Amy smiled, her hand reaching up to hold his. She gave his hand a squeeze, as if to say, "I'm okay." Yet she continued to stare out the window, her eyes watching the backyard carefully – as though somehow, some time, a blue box might fall out of the sky.

"She was worried about me," Amy said. "Kept wanting to know how I was doing."

"She's your mum," Rory reminded her. "Of course she would."

Amy turned towards him. "But what am I supposed to tell her? That my imaginary friend came back for me, and I've been traveling the Universe with him in his little blue box – meeting aliens, creating paradoxes, being an inch away from death just to save the world? She'd never let me go again."

Rory raised an eyebrow. "So you just won't tell her?"

"I don't know," Amy said. She looked into his eyes. "Have you told your dad?"

"No," Rory admitted.

Amy laughed. It came out hollow, almost like a drowning kitten mewing for help. Tears streamed down her cheeks. Rory rushed towards her, wrapping his arms around her. He wanted to protect her. An image flashed into his mind – of plastic, of a red Roman cape, of waiting outside a big black box. Rory held Amy tighter. He would do anything he could to protect her.

"I just don't know what I'm supposed to do," Amy murmured into his shoulder. "I spent twelve years alone after my parents disappeared. Twelve years that never existed and never happened because of the greatest paradox in the history of the Universe – but I still remember as clearly as though they had just happened yesterday. Every change, every shift in time plays out in my head like old movies over and over again – and it never stops." Her voice cracked. "And I can't even complain, because you've been through just as much as me – if not more. The only difference is: I wanted to run away. Sometimes, I still do."

That wasn't completely true, Rory Williams knew. The Doctor had explained it vaguely. Amy had grown up with a crack in her bedroom wall. She remembered things she shouldn't have remembered: events that happened and then didn't happen, times that were and then weren't. Rory had spent plenty of time in the TARDIS and, well, dying and then not being dead – but he hadn't spent twelve years next to a gap in time and space that messed with his memories like Amy. He remembered things – two thousand years of waiting, the feeling of nothingness – but only vaguely. They felt like the time between dreams and waking up: he couldn't quite tell if they had ever really happened.

Besides, what was to say he didn't want to run away either. He didn't want an adventure of his own. The Rory Williams, nurse of Leadworth, had been so boring. It was a wonder Amy even paid a second glance at him. Yet traveling with the Doctor, Rory had learned to be a hero. He had learned what was worth dying for. No matter what happened, Rory Williams knew he would always fight to be with Amy Pond.

"Don't worry," Rory whispered into his wife's hair. He held her tightly in his arms, a silent promise that he would never let her go. "We'll figure it out. We always do."


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: **Very much inspired by waiting-for-the-tardis's tumblr post: /post/44639459044/sorrow-compressed-my-heart-and-i - felt-i-would (Does anyone know how to link outside of ? Is that even possible?)

Trigger warning for self-harm, depression, and suicide. (I'm sorry! Maybe the next chapter will be a little more fun? We'll see...)

* * *

Twelve years and four psychiatrists. Amy had a problem biting them. She remembered one: a balding man with giant, black glasses and a silly, red bow tie who tried to put his arm around her as he reminded her that the raggedy man wasn't real, so it wasn't like he had really abandoned her. No one had abandoned her. His words had frustrated fifteen-year-old Amelia Pond so much that she chomped down on his arm. He had screamed, and that was the end of the appointment. Aunt Sharon scheduled one the next week with another psychiatrist, but for some reason, Amelia never went. She stopped talking about strange men and blue boxes falling from the sky, except with a few choice friends. Aunt Sharon had been relieved. Finally, little Amelia had grown up.

Except she hadn't. She hid her feelings in late night parties, dancing with men she had never met. She liked to imagine some of them with ripped blue shirts and scuffed up Converse sneakers. When she kissed them, she imagined their moans as secret promises: "Come along, little Amelia Pond." "Come travel with me." "Give me five minutes." "Trust me."

She'd move back whenever she got to that point. The guy would stop moaning. He'd open his eyes, dazed and confused.

"What's wrong?" he'd ask. "Why d'you stop?"

She wouldn't know. Sometimes, she'd go back to kissing – pretend that nothing had ever happened. She got pretty good at doing that.

Sometimes, she'd just run. Leave the poor sucker in the loo without explanation. She could get away then, and well, he'd soon forget about her. They always did.

Except for one. Little Rory Williams, the boy almost next door. In all the messed up versions of Amy's childhood, he was always there. He had played the Doctor with her. He had stood up for her when the bullies on the playground teased her – even though it usually meant he got pushed in the sand. He was there on her darkest days, and even though she had poked fun at him constantly, she loved him for that.

Amy knew that, in the most current reincarnation of her past, her daughter Melody Pond had sneakily brought her and Rory together. This childhood had been a happy one. She had two best friends ever since she moved to Leadworth: her future husband and her future daughter. How many little girls could say that? In this childhood, there had been no cracks in the wall. She had both her parents, neither of whom had been too worried about Amelia Pond's insistence that her imaginary friend was real. What was called loneliness in another life was now called creativity.

In this time stream, there had been no psychiatrists, no biting, no lonely years in the back rooms with strangers. The Amy Pond she was today existed only because Melody Pond had moved things into place. Mels was the one who nudged her and Rory together. She was the one who had suggested young Amelia ("Bit too fairy tale.") become sexy Amy ("Much better."). The reasons Amelia Pond became Amy Pond, wife of Rory Williams, had disappeared. Melody helped bring them back into place.

But in another lifetime, in a time stream that no longer existed, Amy had done that all by herself. It happened when she was eighteen. In six months, she would meet the Doctor again – only she didn't know it at the time. All she knew was that the last eleven years had been a long string of strange men and a feeling of loneliness she couldn't shake off.

Amelia Pond was tired. She was tired of being disappointed. She was tired of the whispered condolences, the pity of the adults who would never understand her: "Poor Amelia Pond, all broken and alone." "Poor Amelia Pond, whose only friends are imaginary." "Poor Amelia Pond, don't you feel sorry for her?"

She was tired of waiting.

Little Amelia wasn't sure what her plan was. She wasn't even sure if she had a plan. Everything felt hazy in her head, as though she hadn't slept in a very long time. Yet something drew her to the phone. She picked it up, dialing a number she knew very well.

"Hello?" Rory's voice answered.

"It's me," Amelia said. "Do you still have those old Doctor clothes I made you dress up in?"

Rory paused. "You don't want me to do that again, do you?"

"No, of course not." She bit her lip, thinking over her words carefully. "I'm over that stuff now. You can get rid of it all. I won't need them anymore."

"Um, okay," Rory said.

"Actually, get rid of any Doctor-y stuff you've got," she said. "It was all a bit childish, really–"

"Amelia?"

She flinched. It wouldn't be the last time she hated hearing her childhood name. On the other end of the line, Rory seemed to notice.

"Are you feeling okay, Ames?" he asked her.

Amelia forced herself to sound cheerful. "Of course, I'm fine," she lied. "Super."

"Okay," Rory said.

With that settled, Amelia hung up the phone. She walked upstairs to her room, the room she had since she was a little girl. The crack was still on her bedroom wall, the crack _he _had promised to fix. He had lied.

She went to her dresser and pulled out her nightgown. It was white. The one she had worn as a little girl had red polka dots on it. Amelia walked over to her vanity and pulled out a tube of bright red lipstick. She smudged the lipstick in little circles all over the dress. It looked like her nightgown had chicken pox, but it would have to do. Amelia put it on. She looked at herself in the mirror. Little Amelia Pond, all grown up. If the Doctor came now, would he even recognize her?

She wasn't going to wait to find out. Amelia walked over to her nightstand. Prescription bottles waited for her, all lined up in a row. One for depression, one for ADHD, one for bipolar disorder – over the years, the doctors had all given their own diagnoses for what was wrong with her. None of them had ever come close, but at least they had given her the weapons to fight off whatever it was.

Amelia opened the first bottle and popped the pills in her mouth. She did with the second and the third. Most of them were nearly empty, so she hoped it would be enough. Her stomach churned, but she did her best to hold the sickness in. She laid down in her bed, waiting for the medicine to take effect. She closed her eyes. This would be the last bit of waiting Amelia Pond ever did.

That night, Amelia Pond made a promise to herself. She would never Amelia Pond ever again. It was her way, she thought as she dozed off, of finally giving the raggedy man up.

-.-.-.-.-

It was Rory who had found her. Amy Pond was never sure how he knew to come, but he did. He always did. The doctors told her that Rory had found her and brought her to the hospital in the nick of time. If it wasn't for him, Amy Pond would never have existed. She sometimes wondered what that would mean for the rest of history. If Rory hadn't saved her, would there still be a Melody Pond? Or would the Silence have found another baby, another family to torture? Who would have brought the Doctor back after the second Big Bang? Who would make sure that he wasn't alone?

Of course, that timeline didn't exist anymore. In this one, Amy Pond had grown up happy. Yet she still remembered, even if she wasn't sure Rory did. That was how she knew, no matter how time might twist and turn, that Rory Williams was the one. Because in her darkest time, when she felt the most alone, it was him – and him alone – who had saved her.


End file.
